Foresters eye fallout from S. Ariz. wildfire

The U.S. Forest Service is trying to protect an amphibian on the endangered species list from being buried alive by monsoon floods and sediment left behind after last month's Murphy Complex Fire. The Chiricahua Leopard Frog, a threatened species, is getting some help from the Burned Area Emergency Response team, or BAER, after an assessment deemed the area around the frogs' habitat a "value-at-risk." The BAER team's goal is to reduce the potential damage that sediment and erosion could cause Peña Blanca Lake and nearby Ronquillo Pond once monsoon season is in full effect. The BAER team decides how the soil will react to post-fire weather, such as monsoon storms, and how the water will roll off the soils' surface. Their main concern is watershed overflow from nearby Alamo Canyon Wash and Pena Blanca Canyon Wash. "After the fire burns through, you literally have little to no vegetation left on the surface to collect and slow the water down," said John Hays, Santa Cruz County floodplain coordinator. "Without that vegetation there, you see more water hitting the ground and moving faster." Faster moving water is erosive and can pick up a large volume of sediment in a short amount of time, Hays said...more